The Disaster Mobility Data Network (DMDN) is a global community of practice convened as a partnership between the World Bank’s Global Facility on Disaster Reduction and Resilience (GFDRR) and CrisisReady.
Mobility data can play a vital role in all aspects of emergency management, from building resilient infrastructure and transport systems, to measuring rates and directions of evacuation, to assisting with targeted, timely, and effective recovery efforts. Often, however, data capacity is unevenly distributed, or in scarce supply in emergency management agencies. Private data agreements may preclude direct sharing of mobility data with governments.
Networks of partnerships between academics, data experts, and the response community, as we have learned from the Covid-19 pandemic, can advance the types of equitable and ethical data capacity required to put mobility data to work in emergency response. The DMDN meets on a monthly basis to address key challenges in the use of mobility data to solve data, methods, and translational readiness problems along the entire disaster management continuum, as well as to accelerate collaborations during ongoing response events.
Membership in the DMDN is open to members of the global emergency management community, and to members of the academic community who are advancing practical research applications into the use of mobility data for emergency management and public health. For more information, or to see whether you may be eligible for participation, please contact the global DMDN coordinator agarciatapia@worldbank.org.
